At Monday's practice, that phrase was uttered by Hardin-Jefferson's second-year head football coach. A Hawk player had missed his assignment on offense and DuBois made sure to immediately address the miscue. Despite coming off a season in which the team reached the regional semifinals, and starting this season off with a 35-21 road win at Jasper, there is no time to rest on laurels at H-J.

"We have definitely made up some ground over the last year," DuBois said. "But we want to keep striving to be on the consistent level of teams like West Orange-Stark, Jasper and Silsbee where year in and year out you know we are going to have a good team."

Last season DuBois led H-J to back-to-back playoff victories before falling to Fairfield, which made the Hawks the surprise team of Southeast Texas. If last week's victory over Jasper is any indication, this year's H-J team is transitioning from the role of underdog to favorite.

"We are very used to everybody picking us to lose, so our mentality has always been to outwork the other team and find a way to win the game," Hardin-Jefferson quarterback Camden DuBois said. "Now that people are expecting us to win, we are going to have to grind that much harder because people are going to be gunning for us all year long."

H-J will lean heavily on their vaunted Slot-T offense and improved defense to ease that transition. In last week's win, H-J was able to ground out 400 yards on the ground while causing three turnovers.

"Beating Jasper definitely boosted our confidence and showed everyone we can be good again this season," H-J defensive captain Blain Padgett said. "It's a big deal to be viewed as favorites here at Hardin-Jefferson, but we are not going to get a big head and will respect all of our opponents while we keep doing our jobs and playing like we did in week one."

Running back Logan Thompson is embracing the role of being a favorite but still feels his team has a lot to prove.

"It is good that some people are finally realizing we are a good team who can win a lot of games," Thompson said. "But we still have a huge chip on our shoulder because there are still a lot of people who think we are a one-hit wonder who had a fluke run in the playoffs."

H-J returns to action on Friday as the team faces Kelly Catholic, who is coming off a 56-0 win over Village High School last week to end their 21-game losing streak. Despite that win, H-J is the favorite heading into the game but that hasn't changed the Hawks' approach.

"We want to win every game we play no matter if we are favorite or not," DuBois said. "Our ultimate goal is to get better each week so we can accomplish some special things similar to that Fairfield team we played last year."